When Metroid Prime 4 previews dropped back in November, series fans were rightly worried that the biggest killer in the game may not be scourge of the Space Pirates and bounty hunter extraordinaire Samus Aran, but a geeky sidekick apparently out to murder the series' pensive, lonesome tone with his inane geekery and unwanted guidance.
Not every previewer found him grating, but the general pre-release sentiment was that chatter from Myles MacKenzie and the Galactic Federation team risked destroying the mood which feels like a defining characteristic of the series.
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Fortunately, on playing the full game, it became apparent that the engineer — who can only be the product of a tryst between Gordon Freeman, Zack Braff, and Rick Moranis — wasn't half as obnoxious as he came across in the opening section.
In his review, Ollie said he "genuinely came to enjoy" the presence of the Troopers, and Myles' pinging in the Sol Valley was only a mild irritation in the grand scheme. Perhaps Nintendo should have done a better job showcasing the wider experience for the preview, because MacKenzie made a poor first impression on a lot of people.
Now that the game's been out for a full month and everyone's had time to step into Samus' shoes and witness firsthand Galactic Federation types geeking out over her, we wonder: Have your thoughts on Myles mellowed? Have you, in fact, come to appreciate his help and upgrades? Or have you been a fan from the beginning?
Myles was definitely, appropriately, a point of conversation early doors, but it feels like people have warmed up to him in the last few weeks. Some discoveries and interviews since release have also shed some light on the developers' thinking behind the game's design, encompassing Myles and his loquacious comrades.
A little datamining in the weeks post-launch brought to light over 30 minutes of Federation Trooper dialogue that was left on the cutting room floor, so it seems Retro and Nintendo trimmed back some of the game's chatter for one reason or another. Team Ninja's Other M divided opinion for (among other reasons) being a fairly 'talky' Metroid, and Retro — the studio behind the previous three Prime games — was presumably conscious of maintaining tonal continuity, even if many people from the original Prime dev team are long gone.
In a recent interview with Famitsu, Nintendo said that the game's protracted development and intentional choices to stick with an original vision produced in a game "divorced from the changing of times", resulting in a more "limited" open world than we've grown accustomed to over the Switch generation.
Would a more expansive, Breath of the Wild-style Viewros have affected Myles' patter? You might assume it would increase the quota of 'helpful' radio chatter, but Navi wasn't back and bothering Link in BOTW's Hyrule, was she? An open-world approach would have necessitated a total redesign, though — as discussed in the Famitsu interview — and Nintendo wasn't going to start from scratch again. The solitary ambience is a key part of the Metroid experience, but so too is exploring and unlocking areas on a contained map. As the "Nintendo spokesperson" put it:
"Metroid’s core element of ‘increasing the amount of explorable areas by unlocking powers’ is not very compatible with the ‘freedom to go anywhere from the beginning’ of open worlds."
That doesn't mean you couldn't design a Prime game with that in mind, but that's a very different concept requiring a different approach — and a different pace — to let the terrain do the talking.
Having gotten used to more intelligent design, especially from Nintendo, Myles' chatter is a throwback which rubs some people the wrong way. Perhaps it's nothing to do with his personality - he's just the personification of tired game design that feels old and irritating at best, patronising at worst.
Beyond the Navi-like hand-holding, you could argue that he's part of a proud tradition of Nintendo characters that fans love to hate. Does a cult-like following await the maligned, misunderstood 'Metroid Myles'? Will his name one day be whispered in the reverent tones of a Tingle and an Addison? Will Jim be cracking out his soapbox for a staunch defence in the coming weeks?
For now, let us know below if you think he deserved the Jar Jar-brand vitriol or if a month of MacKenzie has revealed his charms to you. In the ranks of all-time Myles/Miles, he's certainly no Prower or Morales or O'Brien, but who is? Let's not hold that against him.